A woman who met a man at church now fulfills his tickling fantasy for £120 an hour, describing the sessions as meditative and oddly bonding. Melissa Todd, a writer and performer, first encountered her client while giving a talk about kink and Christianity. He was too shy to approach her at the pulpit, but they connected over email, where he revealed his desire: an hour of being tickled, not a theological debate.
From Church Talk to Paid Sessions
Todd had made tickling videos before, where she or someone else gets tied down and assailed with feathers or fingers, but she had never tickled someone in a session. The client, a local man with mutual friends, arrived at her front door looking anxious. After pleasantries, she stripped him naked, tied him down, and began exploratory strokes on his torso, following a list he'd provided of his most tickly bits: chest, torso, armpits, legs, feet, and nipples.
Admitting she is 'rubbish at bondage' and was never a Girl Guide, Todd relied on Velcro and eventually sat on him, which worked effectively and pleased her as she is 'old, and enjoy[s] sitting down.' The client closed his eyes, squirmed slightly, and only his quickening breath indicated any effect. The hour passed quickly, feeling 'rather zen' for Todd, who drifted off into another world, focused only on keeping her fingers moving, confident she was making someone as happy as he could be.
Weekly Visits and the Appeal of Tickling
The man began visiting weekly, paying £120 per session, and Todd found herself looking forward to his visits. She describes his lean, muscly body as something she enjoys playing with, working her fingers over his torso 'as if it were a musical instrument.' Unlike some spanking clients, he remains silent, allowing her to leave windows open during heatwaves. The sessions are 'meditative, restful and oddly bonding,' she says, spending a silent hour with another human.
He particularly enjoys nipple tickling and tells Todd the sensations can linger for days. He is clear about what he wants while surrendering control over when the next touch comes; his job is to experience it, hers to decide where her fingers go next. Todd ponders why anyone would enjoy being tickled, noting it sits 'in an intriguing territory between pleasure and discomfort,' where uncertainty is part of the appeal, and our brains turn anticipation into stimulation.
Why We Can't Tickle Ourselves
She explains that we cannot tickle ourselves effectively because our brains predict our own movements, dampening the sensation. But when someone else does it, we don't know where the next touch will land, and every nerve ending pays attention. This is true of spanking too, another reason her job is safe 'for the foreseeable, even as the computers take over.' Todd concludes that kink is often misunderstood because we assume pleasure must look a certain way, but 'human beings are gloriously odd.' She notes that one person wants to be beaten until he bleeds; another wants to be tickled until he can't think straight, and she is 'here for both.'
